Black Friday is a significant event within the UK business calendar. Black Friday traditionally falls the day after thanksgiving.

Customers will be expecting offers and promotions around this period as 88% of UK e-commerce businesses ran a Black Friday promotion in 2019. This combined with the suggestion that UK businesses can expect to see orders increase by 40% indicate that it’s important to plan accordingly.

With this in mind, we have compiled a list of tips to help ensure that your Black Friday is successful. 

Build Suspense for Black Friday

Creating anticipation is an important marketing tool in preparation for Black Friday. Social media and email campaigns will be some of the most effective communication channels during Black Friday. 81% of social media users use Instagram to find products and services. This indicates the importance to plan an effective social media content strategy to engage these consumers. With users actively searching on Instagram ensure your products and services have a strong social media presence in preparation for Black Friday.

Creating Black Friday specific content will make your audience aware of the upcoming promotions. Ensure that the content is posted regularly so your audience will be reminded of your Black Friday messaging. This is important due to the abundance of noise from competitors due to the popularity of the Black Friday event.

Creating awareness and reinforcing the messaging will in turn create suspense and anticipation prior to the Black Friday promotions going live. 

Site Speed

It was estimated on Black Friday 2020, £7.5 billion was spent by UK consumers. £5.76 billion of this was spent on online stores. This was a 52.8% increase in online shopping based upon the 2019 Black Friday figure. This shows a huge shift towards the growth of revenue for e-commerce on Black Friday. Therefore, with e-commerce revenues at this level and being expected to rise it’s vital that your website can withstand the surge in traffic.

UK consumers spent £7.5 billion on Black Friday 2020

An increase in website traffic can cause sites to decrease in speed and become unresponsive. This negatively impacts upon the user’s experience. A slow site speeds ultimately mean a decrease in sales. It is important to contact your hosting partner ahead of Black Friday to ensure there is a contingency plan in place. This can minimise the risk of your website going down due to a surge in traffic.

Extended Black Friday Promotions

Though Black Friday is on the 26th of November this year, Black Friday is more than just one day. Further considerations include Cyber Monday which presents opportunities to run further promotions. Also many businesses run Black Friday promotions throughout the entirety of November.

31% of UK adults intend to complete their Christmas shopping on Black Friday

Running an extended Black Friday event can pose many benefits such as being able to promote and upsell a variety of products. A recent report suggests that UK adults will intend to complete 31% of their Christmas shopping over Black Friday. Running an extended Black Friday event can help appeal to this group of consumers. Apart from finding a bargain, consumers may complete their Christmas shopping around Black Friday to avoid delivery problems and crowds.  

Customer Experience

Customers having a positive experience should be the paramount objective for any business. This is especially important within your Black Friday campaign. Numerous planning measures should be put into place to ensure a positive customer experience. This includes arranging to be fully staffed throughout your Black Friday promotion so orders can be promptly fulfilled. 

Be prepared for an increase in customer inquires. Be sure to have the internal resources ready to meet this demand and maintain your customer service standards.

A further consideration is to alert your courier for the potential of increased demand due to your Black Friday promotion. This is to minimise the risk of your courier being unable to dispatch your orders.  

To see the Black Friday promotions run by Clothes2order, follow our social media such as our Facebook or Instagram.